Marcus' Sixteenth Birthday
by annievos98
Summary: Marcus is send on a mission to capture Adam, Bree and Chase. Better said, that's what Douglas wants everyone to think. The truth is that he knows Marcus' birthday is coming and he doesn't want to be anywhere near Marcus when that day comes. Because he knows what will happen on Marcus' Sixteenth Birthday. (Also this story contains one of my favourite ships, Marcus/Chase)
1. Chapter 1

_Hello everyone! Welcome to my story!_

 _I hope you'll all like it;)_

 _This story is written mostly from Marcus' point of view. That's because I think Marcus is more human than the series made him look in the end. They let him "presumably" die as if it's nothing, no one even seems to care about him. So here's to make it right. A lot of care for Marcus._

 _Also, S.H.I.E.L.D. is randomly included in this story, but do not worry, if you don't know S.H.I.E.L.D (shame on you! (Nah just kidding, but seriously, you should get to know S.H.I.E.L.D)) that's not a problem, 'cause their role isn't big (that's why I haven't submitted this as a crossover) and I haven't included things you would only understand if you know Marvel._

 _Enjoy:D_

 **Marcus' pov:**

My dad was watching the telly as I (as usual) walked around cleaning his mess. Sometimes I wonder why I never protested. He never really lets me do the fun stuff. There are a lot of things I've simply never done because he thinks it isn't anything a bionic android should do. But what does he know? He isn't the android around here. But well, he's my dad I guess that explains about everything.

"Marcus?" Douglas hardly looked away from the telly as he called my name. What does he want this time? A bank robbery? (Yes he did ask that once). The contains of an old woman's purse? (I really didn't know what he wanted with that but yes, he asked that once too). Oh I know, maybe he finally moved on to his plans of world domination. Guess who gets to do the dirty work for that. _Me?!_ No, where did you get _that_ idea?

"Yes, father?"

"I want you to stay over at Donald's place this weekend." Okay, that was quite unexpected. My cover was already blown, so why would anyone let me in? "I need you to gain their trust again."

"Their trust? Father, I don't really think that's possible anymore." Douglas finally took the effort of looking away from the screen to look at me, his eyes were, for some reason, missing the evil spark they always had. "What's wrong?" I asked, of course I was immediately suspicious. I've spent far too much time with him, so it wasn't really hard to tell when something was wrong. Which hardly ever happened of course.

"There is nothing wrong, I just want you to do as I ask."

"But what for? What good will it do? What's the plan?"

"Not so many questions at once! Please I can hardly even stand one of your questions!" He looked back to the telly again, most certainly he was over thinking what to tell me and what not. "As you might have noticed, my plan for Adam, Bree and Chase didn't work last time. I still want that plan to work, so we need to try again!" And that was all the explanation I was going to get. Well, it doesn't matter. Adam, Bree and Chase were the only friends I've ever had and they weren't even really my friends. But I still kinda liked the idea of going back to them. It has also been a long time since I've left my house.

"You want me to go now?" I asked. It was Friday afternoon and Adam, Bree and Chase were probably already home from school.

"That's the idea, yes." Douglas kept staring at the screen, while he was throwing popcorn in the air and tried to catch it with his mouth.

"Well then, I'll see you Monday." There was a silence.

"Yes... till Monday." I raised my eyebrow at him, of course he didn't see me and it was absolutely no use to ask but I really wondered what was wrong with him. Did he think that I couldn't do this? Or maybe he just remembered he was going to miss my birthday this way, _again_. . I sighed and left the house. I didn't really need to bring any stuff with me, I was just going to pretend that my father threw me out. That he deceived me or something like that. It wouldn't be too hard to believe. The only problem was Leo, he was never going to believe me. On the other side, that problem kinda solved itself. Nobody believed Leo either. I took my motorcycle and drove to their street. I parked my motorcycle on the parking lot and walked the rest of the way to their house. When I arrived I just rang the doorbell and waited for someone to open. As I already expected it was Tasha who opened the door.

"Hello, Mrs. Davenport," I greeted her. I smiled at her but I made sure of a certain sadness in my eyes'cause I needed to pretend that I had been thrown out. Tasha had obviously heard stories from Leo. I saw the doubt in her eyes when she recognized me. By now she was wondering whether to let me in or not. Seeing her face, she was probably not going to let me in. "I'm sorry for bothering you, Mrs. Davenport but I didn't know where to go." I let my eyes fill with tears, this was always the funny part. The part where they would absolutely fall for my act.

"Why is that?" she asked, truly being a bit worried. I stared at the ground, shrugging slightly, pretending that I didn't want her to see my tears.

"My father threw me out," I confessed. After that I broke down in tears and she immediately fell for it. She pulled me inside saying: "Oh, come here, poor boy." _Women_ , I thought to myself. She led me to the couch and told me to sit down. I just kept crying. "He said that I'm a disappointment to him. He said he doesn't _need_ me anymore. What am I supposed to do?" My voice sounded like I was absolutely panicking and I'm pretty sure I also looked like that. Right at that moment, Chase and Bree entered the room. I looked up to them and then I quickly looked away, as if I didn't want them to notice me.

"Marcus?" Chase wondered, his voice didn't sound as hateful as I expected, so that was a good thing.

"What are _you_ doing _here_?" Bree demanded, that _did_ sound hateful. Well, it didn't matter. I'll convince them, one by one if I have to.

"His father threw him out," Tasha whispered to them.

"And why is that?" Bree asked, her question directed at me. I could see at her whole attitude that she wasn't ready to trust me anytime soon but Chase looked like he was.

"Bree don't be so mean, we've got to find out if he's talking the truth before you judge him." Bree raised an eyebrow at him.

"Excuse me? That is _Marcus_ over there, what more proof do you want?"

"Yes," Chase said, "and Douglas is his father. We're talking about mister 'I let my family down all the time'!" Perfect! I thought to myself. They're starting to fight each other already! That could come in handy. If I get Chase to come to my house the others will certainly follow to 'save' him.

"Look," I said, getting their attention again, "if you want me to go then I'll leave."

"Great, the door is over there," Bree responded, pointing at the door.

"Bree! Where is he supposed to go?" Chase protested.

"I don't know, what about his grandma," Bree suggested sarcastically. "If she even exists of course."

"Of course she does!" Chase insisted, then he frowned and turned to me, "she does, right?" I nodded.

"She does but I can't go to her."

"Oh I get it, it's her bingo day!" Bree mocked. "You know what, have fun together. I'm leaving _and_ I'm informing Leo. He's _not_ going to be happy." With that Bree left. Tasha laughed, while she knew there wasn't anything to laugh about.

"Well I guess I'll go... ehm... do something." She quickly ran upstairs before someone could say anything else. I remained at my spot on the couch, I stared to the ground, trying to look uncomfortable. Chase coughed and walked over to me, he sat down on the couch. He left a lot of space between us, probably because he was a bit unsure whether he should trust me or not.

"So ehm... what happened?" Chase's voice sounded kind. Why was he being so kind? Did he really try to be friends? Why would he do that, after all I've done... and what I'm still doing…

"He sent me to steal some important USB from a man but when I had it he wanted me to kill the man... I couldn't. I just couldn't, the man hadn't done anything wrong... how could dad ask that from me?" I started crying again and Chase bought it. Hah, sometimes it was just too easy.

"Hey, it's okay Marcus, you've done the right thing." I shook my head.

"Dad didn't think so, I came home and he ignored me for a full day and then he... he screamed at me... saying that I was a failure and then he just threw me out." I threw my head down, I stopped crying 'cause otherwise I might overdo it. Suddenly Chase's hand was on my back. I was surprised that he actually tried to comfort me. It made me feel... kind of guilty. Wait. _What?_ It's not like I've never tricked anyone before, some days it was all I did.

"Why don't you stay here this weekend? Maybe Douglas has calmed down by Monday and then you can go talk to him." This was just too easy. I would almost laugh but I don't make mistakes like that.

"I would only be a burden, besides, no one wants me here."

"I'll convince them and you won't be a burden. It will be fine." I looked up to him.

"Thank you, Chase, for believing me." Chase nodded.

"No problem. Come," Chase got to his feet and gestured for me to come along. "I know something you'll probably like." I followed him to their lab. I can't believe he's actually taking me there, clearly not as smart as he claims he is. He showed me some new game system of Mr. Davenport. You just have to put on glasses and you're inside the game. It was actually rather cool and really realistic. The last time I had so much fun must have been when I joined the band of Chase and Adam. When I come to think of it, that might very well have been the _only_ time I had fun.

"Oh no Chase, quickly hide yourself behind that small chair!" Adam's voice obviously. I removed my glasses and Chase had done the same.

"Adam, there's nothing to hide for," Chase said.

"Ehm... Chase, I don't want to disturb your peace but there's a super evil guy standing right beside you. Maybe if you run fast you might survive it, you're small so you're not easy to hit."

"Adam!"

"Please, I don't want you to argue because of me. I'll just go," I offered, knowing it would only make Chase protest more.

"No, no you don't have to leave," Chase told me. "Adam, Marcus is here because he doesn't want to do bad things anymore, his father threw him out so he is going to stay with us." Chase talked very slowly to Adam but he still didn't really seem to get it.

"But why doesn't he stay with his grandma then?"

"Adam! Will you just stop?" Adam held up his hands in defence.

"Fine, fine but I don't think his grandma is going to like it when she hears that Marcus is with us instead of her." Adam grabbed a bucket of apple juice. Why he had that? I have no idea. He took it with him to the elevator and went back upstairs again.

"I'm sorry for his behaviour... he ehm... is just being... Adam..."

"No it's okay, I get it," I said. Chase and I decided to play for a bit longer, till Bree entered the lab and told us she wanted to sleep. In other words, we should get out of here or at least, _I_ had to get out of here.

"So we don't really have a spare capsule but we have a guest room," Chase explained when we entered the elevator.

"That's okay, I can do without it for a week at most, so a day won't be a problem."

"Oh well, in that case, guest room it is." He led me to their guest room before he left to go sleeping in his tube. After I made sure no one could hear me I called my dad with my communication app.

"Yes?" Douglas' voice went through my head. If you aren't used to it, it would probably freak you out, but well, I was used to it.

"Chase easily bought my story, Tasha did too but I think Bree is going to be hard to convince. But when I get Chase to our house the others will follow soon."

"Well done, Marcus."

"Thanks, but I'm going to sleep now. I'm actually kinda tired."

"That's okay... I'll ehh I'll talk to you tomorrow."

"Yeah alright." He hung up and I lay down on the bed. It wasn't a lie, I was really tired. Keeping my cover up all day was normally never that tiring to me, almost nothing was. Although I think the game with Chase hadn't really been a cover. It had almost been as if we were _friends_. I smiled at that thought but then it faded again. I had lied to Chase, _again_ , he wasn't my friend and he would never be. I closed my eyes and it wasn't much longer before I fell asleep.

The next day I woke up really late. It was about half past eleven. I didn't know why I had slept for so long, I never sleep longer than eight o'clock in the morning. I decided to just go downstairs and get some breakfast, I was quite hungry. When I came into the living room, only Bree and Leo were there. That wasn't fortunate but maybe I could try to convince them in... well at least try to _not_ kill me.

"Ah look who's there, it's Captain Eyebrows! Did anyone tell you you're not welcome?" Leo asked. He was searching something in the fridge which he obviously couldn't find. Bree was waiting beside him with two still empty bowls.

"Ehm... yes I've been informed."

"Great! Oh and ehm the door is over there," Leo said, pointing at the door.

"Yeah I told him yesterday but I guess he just doesn't know what a door is meant for," Bree added.

"Look, I get why you're mad at me. You have the full right to be, but I'm really not going to do anything this time. I just didn't know where to go, that's all." I knew I could be quite convincing when I wanted to be but Leo had the remarkable talent of not believing _anything_ I said.

"And you expect us to believe _that_?" Leo stared at me questioningly. Leo was too suspicious but that might even work in my advantage. His obsessive behaviour might start to sound a bit overdone, making Bree question his accusations.

"Marcus? Are they bothering you again?" Chase came into the room.

"No, it's okay," I said. Leo's mouth dropped dramatically.

"You're on _his_ side?!" he exclaimed. "He's on _his_ side?" he asked Bree. Bree shrugged.

"Apparently, yes."

"I can't believe this, I think I just lost my appetite." Leo walked away from the fridge before noticing a chocolate bar on the kitchen table. "Okay, except for that." He grabbed the chocolate bar, gave me and Chase a warning glare and left the kitchen.

"Chase, a word please," Bree demanded before dragging him along to the hallway. I sighed and walked over to the kitchen cabinet. I took a few slices of bread, not minding the dry taste of it and sat down on the couch. Suddenly I heard a weird noise, it was coming from outside and it was definitely coming closer. Without warning a drone flew right through the door, dropped a letter at my feet and left through the window, shattering the glass. I stared at the letter in surprise, why was anyone delivering a letter with a drone? I picked up the letter up and read to whom it was addressed. Even more surprisingly, it was addressed to me.

 _Dear Marcus_ , it said. I immediately recognized the handwriting of my father. Which was actually kinda wondrous 'cause he wasn't much of a writer. I don't think he ever wrote a letter to anyone before. The words that followed after that gave me chills, it didn't predict anything good. _There is something you need to know._ I swallowed, took a breath and read the full letter. Suddenly I couldn't breathe anymore, the letter dropped to the ground, my vision became a blur. This couldn't be true... it couldn't... Why would he do that to me? Why hasn't he told me before? Why did he send me away on some mission if I was to... No. No that can't be, father needs me... I have to bring Chase home, I have to complete my mission... I have to be home by Monday... but there would be no Monday. Was I nothing more than an object, one that could be replaced? Would he make a better version of me? He didn't even have the guts to tell me, he just wrote a letter. _A letter._ A letter to tell me this, and he was just going to move on. Just like that... leaving me alone.

"Marcus?" I felt Chase's hand on my shoulder, I didn't know for how long he already stood there, I hadn't noticed his presence before.

"Leave me alone," I told him as I got to my feet, I nearly fell to the ground as I did so. I hated the weakness I was showing but I couldn't help it. I made my way to the door. I was vaguely aware of Chase calling after me but it didn't matter, nothing mattered anymore. How could it?

Author's note:

 _So, how did you like my story so far? I really enjoyed writing it, that's for sure^^_

 _Let me know what you think:)_


	2. Chapter 2

_So there we are again;) New chapter here^^ I had a hard time with this one, but I managed. I hope you like it:D_

 **Chase's pov:**

"Marcus! Where are you going?" I ran after him but he was too fast, he used his super speed and was long gone before I even reached the door. "Marcus!" I called again.

"What's wrong? And what the heck happened to the door and that window?" Bree inquired, entering the room.

"I... I don't know..." I had never seen Marcus so sad before, well of course he had cried before. His father threw him out and the first time we met him he had pretended to be sad too, but not like this. Never like this, this seemed different... much worse.

"Ehm Chase?" I turned around to look at Bree, she was holding a letter and frowned at it. "I think Marcus wasn't really lying this time."

"Let me see it," I commanded, pulling the letter out of her hands. I opened the letter and read what it said.

 _Dear Marcus,_

 _There is something you need to know._

 _I know I should've told you before but I couldn't. I want you to know that I haven't forgotten you birthday, I know it's tomorrow and I knew that last year too and the year before... It just became hard for me to celebrate, because it isn't something I can celebrate anymore. And it's time that you know that too._

 _You know that you're an android and you're aware of your enormous strength too, but what you don't know is that such strength wasn't easy to achieve and also not something that could've been done without a compromise. Your chip has an expiration date, if I can call it that way. I've tried, Marcus, I really did... but I couldn't make it last longer than sixteen years. I'm sorry._

 _Goodbye, my dear son._

"What?" I exclaimed after re-reading it three times. "This must be a joke right? He can't be serious about this."

"I don't know Chase, it seems pretty serious to me and Marcus seems to think so too."

"It can't be so simple, there _has_ to be a solution. There's _always_ a solution!" But Douglas obviously didn't know one, or did he? No, he wouldn't leave his son to die if there was a chance of saving him, right? "Can't we just give him a new chip?" I thought out loud.

"A new chip, do you even know what you're saying?" Bree answered. I was glad to notice that she actually seemed a bit worried about Marcus. No matter how much you hate your enemies, never wish them death, 'cause then you're about as bad as they are, or _seem._

"I know! I know, alright but we have to do something. We can at least try."

"Do you even know how to build a new chip?" I shook my head, I didn't. I've never build a chip before and it wasn't something you can just simply find on the internet.

"Big D must have some old descriptions of it. If I can find them I can maybe solve it." I wished Mr. Davenport was home himself but he wasn't. He was gone on some business trip, to show some important guy one of his new inventions. He's probably not coming home before midnight. "We have to try, Bree." She nodded.

"I know, let's search them then." We went to the lab and searched the whole place. We searched in his digital files, we searched the few paper files he had but there was nothing about our chips.

"What are we looking for?" The sound of Leo's voice startled me. I was so concentrated I hadn't noticed him. That was rare for me.

"Files," I answered, without further explanation. Bree got up from the place she was searching.

"We need files about our chips, we need to know how Mr. Davenport made them." Bree explained to Leo.

"Oohh... wait what for?"

"For Marcus," I told him.

"For... Marcus?" Leo asked carefully, as if to check if he was right.

"Read this letter," Bree said, giving Leo the letter we had found on the ground. Leo read it and his eyes became wide.

"Marcus is going to die tomorrow?" he asked uncertain. I didn't answer, he didn't need an answer. I was absolutely certain that Leo was going to be happy, he had a serious grudge against Marcus. But to my surprise he didn't look happy, he probably realized how serious this was. That Marcus was actually going to die, just like that. "Have you searched his bedroom yet?" I smacked my head to the wall. Why didn't _I_ think of that?! People always keep their most valuable possessions close.

"Good thinking Leo, let's go there." We left to Big D's room and threw the whole place upside down. Eventually we found a safe, hidden behind one of his Davenportraits. "It must be in there," I decided. It wasn't really hard for me to crack the code and open the safe. When I looked inside I saw a lot of papers, they had obviously lain there for quite a long time. I took a look at them and knew that it were the right files. There was only one problem, I really didn't understand a thing of what was written there. The description was written in some kind of secret code, which I could probably hack but that would cost us time again.

"Are they in there?" Bree questioned. I nodded.

"Yes but I have to crack this code before I can start anything." I showed her the papers.

"Damn it, why did Big D make it so hard?"

"I don't really think it's Big D who did this, look at the handwriting," I asked Douglas' letter from Leo and held it next to the papers I was holding, "Douglas wrote this."

"Well that's not good," Leo stated, "what do we do now? Force Douglas to reveal his code?"

"He's not just going to give us the code, with everything happened I doubt if he even wants Marcus to survive." I sighed and looked at the papers again. "I just have to crack it myself." Leo looked like he had absolutely no faith in me and Bree looked about the same. I didn't really have much faith in myself either. Let's say I _can_ crack the code, then what do I do next? Building a chip was not going to be easy. "I'm going to the lab," I said. Being in our lab always helped me concentrate more and think better. Leo and Bree didn't follow and I was thankful for that, they would only distract me. I sat down at Leo's desk and stared at the papers. In my head I first considered every _existing_ code but that was in vain, Douglas had developed his own code. Alright, think logical... think like Douglas, you're an evil mastermind, what do you base your code on? Nothing... I wouldn't base my code on anything... Douglas probably just designed the most random code ever, not caring to put any logic into it. Only he would understand... well that would have been true, if it wasn't for me of course. This code was going to be cracked, no matter how long it took me...okay that actually did kinda matter.

It took me two hours. Two hours to crack that damn code and then another one and a half to translate _everything_. But the hard part had only just started, now I had to make the chip. I called Bree and let her collect everything I needed, which took her about three seconds, and started working. First step was to understand what I had just translated and that was harder than I thought it would be. I was supposed to be the smartest man alive but I only understood half of what these papers said. It was very frustrating and eventually I decided to just start with it. I would see how far I could come. After four hours that seemed to be almost nowhere. I had started again, for the seventh time and I screwed up again. I dropped my head on the desk. This was never going to work, we needed Big D.

"Chase, you need to eat something." Bree laid her hand on my shoulder, studying the mess I had made.

"I can't do it, Bree, I can't build a chip," I confessed, looking up at her.

"It's okay Chase, you've tried. Big D will be home soon, we'll let him try but you've got to eat first." I nodded, although it wasn't _okay_ , it was not okay to just give up on saving someone's life. I followed Bree upstairs and was welcomed by a delicious scent.

"I baked you a pie!" Leo exclaimed with a wide smile on his face. I raised my eyebrow at him and he sighed. "Yeah alright, mom made it."

"Shouldn't we be eating pie tomorrow? When we know if there even is something to celebrate." I appreciated their attempts to cheer me up but truth is, I wasn't the one who needed this. Marcus did. Marcus needed good friends and happy memories, Marcus needed to know if there was a future for him or not. I didn't need a pie, I wasn't the one who deserved it.

"Just eat something, will you?" Bree said, handing me a piece of the pie.

"Fine." I took the pie and ate it rather fast. I hadn't realized how hungry I was. I had been too busy to care.

"So how's the chip going?" Leo asked. Bree made a 'cut it' gesture but I had already heard the question.

"Bad, couldn't have been worse." Leo bit his lip.

"Well it could have been worse," Leo tried, "imagine Adam trying to build a chip!"

"Why would I do that?" Adam laughed when he came inside. Leo laughed when he saw Adam and Bree immediately took a picture.

"Adam, why are you _blue_?" I asked. Adam just laughed.

"I went with Mr. Davenport and he had this invention," Adam laughed a bit at the memory, "it exploded."

"Yeah, because of you! There goes another two million dollar investment." Mr. Davenport appeared behind Adam and closed the door.

"Mr. Davenport! You're home, finally! Come quickly!" I jumped up and dragged him along.

"Hold on, slow down Chase! What's wrong? Did Leo destroy anything?"

"He!" Leo protested. Mr. Davenport shrugged.

"What? It was a logical assumption."

"It doesn't matter, okay?" I said and snatched the letter out of Bree's hands, holding it up in front of Mr. Davenports face.

"What's that?" he asked before took the letter from me. His eyes widened as he read it. "His birthday... that's tomorrow?"

"Yes and you have to help me, I'm building a new chip for him but I can't make it work!"

"Wow wait, you've been trying to build a chip?"

"He's been working on that for almost eight hours now," Bree said.

"I don't get it? Why is Chase building a chip?" Adam asked.

"It's for a good cause, Adam, why don't we go ehm... fruit racing!" Leo suggested. Adam yelled enthusiastically and went outside with Leo, taking a couple of oranges with them. It was a good idea of Leo to distract Adam, he would only be standing in the way. When Adam and Leo had left, Mr. Davenport let out a sigh.

"Look, Chase, I appreciate your attempts but... even I can't build a new chip for Marcus." What? _What?_

"You can't?" I asked in disbelief. No this couldn't be true. We had to save Marcus and I couldn't do it, Mr. Davenport _has_ to do it.

"You know I didn't build your chips, right? I've never been able to do it." Big D looked really sad, probably because he didn't like to admit there was something he _couldn't_ do.

"Then Leo was right," Bree said, "We'll have to force Douglas." Big D raised an eyebrow at her.

"He's not going to help us," he said.

"Who said anything about asking nicely?" I asked him. Mr. Davenport sighed but he realized it was the best thing we could do if we wanted to help Marcus.

"Fine, Bree? You and Adam are going to get Douglas here. Just drag him along, I'll do the talking, alright? Chase, you need to find Marcus, if we want this to work we'll need him, obviously, so go get him and... do something fun. He'll probably need that. I'll give a call when... _if_ we're finished, okay?"

"Okay, but just... make it work," I said. He nodded and he shove me towards the door.

"Now go, find him." I switched my locator app on and searched for Marcus' chip. It didn't take me long to find it in a small village about a hundred miles away.

 **Marcus' pov:**

I didn't know for how long I already sat here. When I ran away from Chase's house I hadn't bothered to check where I was going at all, I just ran and ended up somewhere. I was in the middle of a small village. Not a single person was outside at this time in the night. I had found a bench in a small park that was placed in the heart of the village. The bench was nearly overgrown by plants and it stood in the shadow of a large oak. It was rather cold outside but I didn't really notice that, I never really did. I wondered if my father was thinking about me now, if he was wondering where I was. If he checked my location, as he used to do before. I have always hated that, his constant checking, he did never really give me the chance to go anywhere he didn't want me to be. Was this small village a place where he wanted me to be? Or did he just stop caring, 'cause I was already dead to him. Was that how Chase thought of me now too? A living dead-man? I couldn't blame him, it made sense. I've hurt their family so much, they're probably just celebrating this now. I wished Chase and I could've been real friends. Not only him, Adam and Bree too, hell even Leo. If I only were the person I pretended to be, but I wasn't. As Leo has said, I'm evil. What's happening to me now is just what I deserve. I felt tears in my eyes, they had come and gone over the past hours. I hated to give in to my own sadness. I had almost always managed to push any kind of emotion aside. And now it was my last day to walk around on this earth and I wasted it crying and feeling sorry for myself. What else was I supposed to do? There was no one to spend my last day with. I was ripped from my thoughts when I heard an engine roaring, a car was coming closer. Strange, this whole village almost seemed dead and then suddenly a car arrived in the middle of the night? I looked up in the direction of the noise and saw a car that I vaguely recognized. Well, that wasn't all too weird of course, 'cause there were a lot of the same cars using the roads. I watched the person who stepped out of the car and was shocked to see that I recognized him too. It was Chase. What was he doing here? Chase looked around himself, he probably had his locator app on, so it wouldn't be long till he found me. He walked around the car and stared into the dark surroundings I had covered myself in, his eyes were adjusting to the sudden change of light and then he recognized me. A smile of... was it relief? Appeared on his face as he walked closer to me.

"Hey," he said when he was no more than two metres away. "Do you mind?" he asked, gesturing to the bench I was sitting on. I shook my head and he sat down. I looked away from him, not wanting him to see the state I was in. "Quite a peaceful village," Chase stated. I didn't react. After a few more minutes Chase broke the silence again. "I owe you an apology, Marcus." That made me look up at him.

"How do _you_ owe _me_ an apology?" I asked, 'cause it didn't make sense at all. I was the one who had made all the mistakes, I was the one who had tried to kill Chase and not only him.

"For not helping you before," he looked me in the eyes and it suddenly became very hard for me to withstand that. "When Douglas held us captured, he told us that you're an android. He told us that you'd probably... 'burn out' when you turn sixteen... then we escaped and for a few weeks I actually believed you hadn't survived those rocks. When we heard you _had_ survived it, the thought about what Douglas had told us didn't occur to me anymore. We should've started helping you weeks ago but instead, we didn't."

"It's not your fault, you didn't have any reason to help me even if you thought of it, so it's okay."

"No, it's not okay, Marcus. And we're going to make things right, I'm not making the mistake of not helping you again." I laughed at that, a bitter laugh, filled with emotion I so strongly tried to hide.

"You can't help me, no one can," I said, staring at the ground again.

"Douglas can."

"Dad won't help me, if he wanted to, he could've done that a long time ago."

"Well, it isn't exactly about what he wants. It's more about what _we_ want. Adam and Bree have probably already brought him to our house by now and they are going to make him cooperate. He is going to build you a new chip, Marcus." I looked up at Chase and stared into his eyes, searching a reason why he was doing this.

"I don't deserve your help."

"Everyone deserves a second chance, and you are getting one." I gave him a sad smile.

"No, you don't understand. I've already wasted my second chance," he looked at me with confusion on his face, so I explained it to him. "My dad never kicked me out, I was on a mission to lure you to my father, again." Chase looked away from me for a moment and took a breath, before looking back again.

"Look, I don't really care why you came to our home yesterday. What matters is that, from now on, you're going to make your own decisions and not the ones your father made."

"You seem very confident that your plan will work," I stated. Chase nodded and smiled at me.

"That's because it _will_ work, I refuse to believe otherwise." I stared at him in disbelief. Why was he being so nice? He should be celebrating right now, throwing a party and eating cake. I was his enemy, I tried to destroy him and yet here he was... being the good guy he was supposed to be. He suddenly grabbed my hand, the unexpected touch made me shiver. "Come on," he said, "we're going to do something fun." He dragged me along to his car and opened the door for me. I didn't say anything, I didn't really know what to say, so I just sat down. Chase took place at the driver's seat and started the engine. He turned the car around and drove away from the village we'd been in.

"So, where do you want to go?" he asked after a while. I frowned at him.

"What do you mean? Aren't we going to your home?"

"Nope, we're going somewhere _you_ want to go. Tell me something you've always wanted to do," Chase said, his voice sounding enthusiast and encouraging. I was too stunned to answer so Chase continued talking. "Ice-skating, sky-diving, swimming, whatever you want."

"I... I have always wanted to go ice-skating," I said to my own surprise. Chase smiled.

"Ice-skating it is, though I must warn you. I suck at it." I laughed at his comment. Chase was being so relaxed and friendly that it suddenly seemed like all the pain and sorrow form the past hours were simply gone. It seemed like there wasn't even something to worry about. I was going to go ice-skating with... with a friend. It was in the middle of the night and I was going to go ice-skating. Chase turned the volume of the radio higher and started singing along with "Happy" from Pharrell Williams. I absolutely hated the song but I knew the lyrics and it didn't cost Chase a lot of effort to drag me along with his happiness. After a while we both fell silent, tired of the singing but it was fine. Compared to the uncomfortable silence before, it was fine. I looked sideways at Chase and studied his face. I couldn't believe that I had actually spent so much time of my life hating that boy. I studied his hand on the acceleration poke and made a mindless decision. I laid my hand over his and smiled at the sight. I noticed Chase looking over but he quickly turned his eyes to the road again.

"You know," I started, still a bit unsure why I did, "before that day, when you escaped, I didn't even know that I'm an android. He had never told me. I just assumed that everything, like the whole recharging thing, I just assumed it was normal, that _you_ did that too. But that day when I woke up under those rocks, I looked at my arm, my legs and they're just... they are metal, Chase. What does that make me? I don't even have a heart." Chase kept his eyes on the road but I saw his mouth twitch a bit.

"It doesn't matter what you look like, Marcus, what matters is what you are. Human." I frowned at his words. It was funny, I had said those words to myself a lot of times, but I always came to another conclusion. What matters is what you are, I had always answered that with 'bionic' and later 'android', but Chase just used to same method to draw another conclusion. "You do know that right? You're just as much human as me or Leo or anybody else." I looked at our hands as Chase let go of the acceleration poke and held my hand in his. "Say it, say it and believe it." I replaced my gaze to stare at Chase's face again. He didn't say another word, he just waited for me to speak.

"I'm human," I said after a while and strangely, with all kind of emotions swirling through my body, I actually believed that. Chase smiled as he let go of my hand to switch.

"We're there," he announced. "Let's go Ice-skating." It wasn't really hard for us to break into the ice-rink. The cameras and the security system were easily hacked. When we were inside Chase gasped. "I had forgotten how cold an ice-rink is." I smirked at him.

"It's meant for _ice-skating_ , how can you forget its purpose?" Chase just shrugged.

"Well... not its purpose obviously but..." Chase said and then he quickly turned around. "Look, they keep their steels there, we should go get some." I smiled at the thought, Chase on steels, well... that could be interesting. Chase hacked the security system on the door to their storage and searched for the right size. I followed him and searched my size too. When we had found them we took them to a nearby bench and put them on. It was really weird, I have never been on steels before and Chase told me his last time had been a long time ago. We walked over to the ice and I immediately noticed Chase hadn't exaggerated about his ice-skating skills. He had only set one foot on the ice and had already fallen on his back. I couldn't help but laugh at his clumsy behaviour but I helped him up. I followed him on the ice, fully prepared to fall but I actually managed to stand. I knew I was very good at keeping my balance, but I never thought it would also help me with something like this.

"Beginner's luck," Chase joked as he smiled. Eventually it appeared to be more than 'beginner's luck', I was actually pretty good at ice-skating. Chase on the other hand was really bad at it. At one moment he had actually managed to let me trip over his feet, as he suddenly skated way of his direction, which made me fall to the ground... well ice, actually.

"I'm sorry! Are you alright?" Chase asked as he came, or at least tried to come closer.

"Yeah, don't worry I'm fine." I told him. Chase came closer and offered me his hand to help me up. I didn't know if it was such a smart idea but I took his hand anyway. Chase pulled me up but lost his own balance when he did so, causing him to fall on his back and dragging me along with him.

"Argh, I _do_ really suck at this, don't I?" I smiled down at him.

"Yup, you really do." He laughed and so did I. When he stopped laughing, he just kept staring at me. He kept looking into my eyes, searching for something, but I didn't know what. I suddenly felt the urge to do something I shouldn't and I quickly rolled aside and pushed myself up before I actually did it. "What time is it?" I asked. To my surprise I had actually forgotten why we came here. What tomorrow... or well _today_ meant for me.

"Half past three," Chase said, looking a bit shocked, probably because he too had forgotten the time. "You know what," Chase suggested, quickly recovering himself. "I'm kinda hungry, what about you?"

"Now that you mention, yes actually."

"Why don't we go get a pizza or something?"

"A pizza at half past three? Yeah why not," I agreed. We went back to the car and Chase drove to the nearest pizza place. You'd think those places would be closed at this time in the morning but there were actually a few opened. Chase parked his car in front of a park nearby and we walked to the shop. Just as we had crossed the street some men in black suits walked up to us.

"Marcus Davenport?" one of them asked. I looked up at them in confusion, immediately distrusting the situation.

"I'm sorry, you must have mistaken me for someone else," I told them with a smile.

"Have a nice day," Chase added as we simultaneously turned around to walk away.

"Not so fast boy." Something in his voice made me stop, made me hesitate. I looked around myself, scanning the location.

"Oh no..." I whispered as I started recognizing the shapes of snipers throughout the whole place. They were on the roofs, behind the windows, inside vans, behind the bushes in the park, they were _everywhere_. They were hiding of course, but how could I have _not_ seen them. I turned around to the four men that had walked up to us. "What do you want?"

"We need you to come with us." Chase looked at me worriedly.

"What's this about?" he asked. I looked back at him.

"I don't know, but I need you to leave and go home." Chase needed to be gone, if they let him leave I would have the chance to use my super-speed to rush out of here. But there was a big chance they already knew about that, why else would they be here?

"I'm not leaving you, Marcus," he insisted, then he turned to the four men, "Tell me why you're here. I won't leave till you do."

"That's classified information, boy," the man on the right said.

"Marcus Davenport, you've got one last chance to cooperate out of free will. After that I'm afraid we'll have to use violence." the left guy said. I reached out to grab Chase's hand but when I did so, red dots appeared on his chest. _Snipers._

"You can't do that," I said. They couldn't do that, could they? They couldn't threaten to kill an innocent citizen, let alone _kill_ him. But I didn't want to find out the hard way, so I held my hands in the air, making sure they knew I was up to nothing. "Chase, go please, inform dad that I won't be home for breakfast." I didn't specify if I meant _my_ dad or _his_ because I meant both, but I couldn't explain what I actually wanted to say with those guys listening to every word we said. But Chase understood, ask my dad what the hell he has done (this was obviously his fault) and ask his dad for help.

"Okay, but tell me where you're taking him," he tried one last time.

"Classified," the same man as before spit the words out, he was probably tired of waiting. The man beside him took a step forward and held his handcuffs up.

"Turn around, hands on your back," the man commanded. I did as he asked, I couldn't take the risk to escape. I could try to use my super-speed to get us both out of here but it was too risky. The man stepped forward and closed the handcuffs around my wrists. I cried out in pain as I felt a sudden sting in my wrists.

"Marcus?" Chase asked worriedly but he stopped himself from rushing towards me, because the snipers still had their guns pointed at him. "What's wrong?" he asked the men. One of them laughed.

"Well we're not idiots, that's to prevent him from doing anything stupid." I realized he was right, my bionics were blocked. Those pins that had come out of his stupid handcuffs had probably infected my system. There was only one person who could do that to me and he happened to be my father. The man grabbed my arm roughly and dragged me along.

"No wait!" Chase protested, but he didn't dare to move.

"Don't worry, Chase, just go home, it'll be fine." It didn't look like it was going to be fine but what was I supposed to say? The men dragged me along into their van and closed the door. I took a deep breath as my sight on Chase disappeared, the last time I would see him.

 _Author's note:_

 _So yeah, there's something very spontaneous at the end herexD But I hope you liked it anyways. I felt like there wasn't enough happening in the story, so I made something happenxD_

 _Let me know what you think;)_


	3. Chapter 3

_So this is going to be the last chapter, sorry guys (unless you dislike my story, in that case: I'm happy that you're relievedxD). We're now continuing Marcus' sudden journey~~_

 **Marcus' pov:**

"Who informed you?" I asked, already knowing the answer.

"Well boy, that's classified of course." I didn't need an answer anyway. It was perfectly clear. My father informed them. Why? Well, probably because he thinks I'm planning on taking revenge after he made me a new chip. He was wrong about that, I was just planning on never talking to him again, but _of course_ , being who he is he assumed the worst. Damn it. What was I supposed to do now? I decided to do nothing. I couldn't escape, that was for sure and I wasn't going to cooperate either. Why would I? I was going to die anyway. We didn't really drive that long, so that means we also weren't that far away. When the door opened I saw that we were leaving of the city. We stood in front of what seemed to be an abandoned gas station.

"Who the hell do you belong to?" I wondered. If this was their facility, well it was probably underground, but why would the FBI have an underground lair? "Oh no wait, don't bother I get it, it's classified." The men didn't answer. They took me inside and I appeared to be right, there was a secret facility underground. They put me in some kind of interrogation room, there was a table in the middle of it and they tied me up to a chair on one side of the table. Not much later a man, who I hadn't seen before, came inside. He didn't sit down.

"So, Marcus Davenport?" he asked. I didn't answer his question, not only because it was already obvious. "Well, I should welcome you to S.H.I.E.L.D., I suppose. Only fact is, you're not quite welcome." The man smiled at me, though he wasn't trying to be kind at all. What had he just called this place? Shield? Like, _the_ S.H.I.E.L.D.? Like the superhero movies? Did that actually exist? This is a joke right? "Let me introduce myself, I am Agent Edward. Now let me make something clear. You've got very bad luck. Agent Coulson is momentarily not present, so I'm in charge, making this the worst thing that could've happened to you." I raised my eyebrow at him, not in the least intimidated. The man, Agent Edward, walked around the table. "There are two ways on which we can do this, of course you can already predict what's coming next. The easy or the hard way."

"Well then I guess my answer will be rather predictable too." Edward stopped walking when he was back in front of his chair, opposite of me. He looked into my eyes and nodded.

"As you wish." The man put a paper on the table and gestured at it. "I have to give you one chance to fill this paper." I smiled at him.

"That's very generous, sir, but I'll politely decline."

"I was hoping you would say that, it makes my job a lot more fun. While all these tech-nerds are busy screening your system and finding all kinds of uninteresting things, I might as well enjoy myself trying to find some through physical contact." Edward had started walking again and now he stopped behind me. Without a warning I felt his hand on the back of my head as he pushed my face down to the table with an enormous force. I felt my nose cracking at the sudden hit. It hurt like hell but something like this was never going to make me open up to him. His fingers grabbed my hair and pulled my head up again. "Look _machine_ , do you really want to spend the rest of your days behind bars? Cause that's what you're going to get when you don't cooperate." I laughed at his ignorance, if only he knew. There were not much more than only a few hours left to live for me. Makes it a pretty lousy threat, doesn't it? "You think this is funny, huh?" he asked.

"Look _sir_ , do you want to spend _your_ days trying to break me? 'Cause I promise you, you won't. You want to stay here, beat me up? Fine, stay. Just know that I won't tell you a thing." That wasn't a lie or just though talk, it was true. I wasn't going to tell him anything and there was nothing, absolutely nothing he could do to make me. Agent Edward growled, frustrated 'cause he did recognize my determination. He pulled a drawer out and put it on the table. Inside of it were... well, tools. Actual torture tools, _metal_ torture tools. I laughed at him, oh he was such an idiot. The poison from the handcuffs only works for one hour, it had worn off. Oh yeah, this was going to be fun. I smiled evilly at the man.

"What are you smiling at, you freak."

"Wanna find out?" I didn't wait for his answer. I activated my molecular kineses and pushed the table back to the wall, crushing the ignorant man. He grunted, I had hit him pretty hard. He spit some blood on the table and looked up to me.

" _You_..." he started, but I interrupted him.

"Don't talk without permission, _sir_ , I'm afraid you'll have to be punished." I let some of his own tools float in the air in front of him, enjoying the look of horror on his face when he realized he wasn't standing a chance. I let one of the knives struck forward into his stomach, it wouldn't kill him... well not instantly at least. He screamed out in pain, unable to move due to the table which still held him pressed against the wall. "How do you like this now, Agent Edward."

"Go to hell," he growled.

"Gladly but will you join me, sir?" Suddenly a cloud of gas was blasted in my face. It probably contained the poison again, took them long enough. I breathed it in, it was unavoidable. I coughed and lost my grip at the table and the tools, which fell to the ground. The man tried his best to remain in his standing position and looked at me like he would kill me... I suppose he would if he didn't have orders. The man took his gun from his belt and pointed it at me.

"Be my guest," I encouraged him, "but know that I'm not going to be the one that gets fired for this." The man growled once again and changed his aim. His gun was now pointed at my stomach.

"I wouldn't do that if..." he effectively cut me short by releasing the bullet. The pain immediately spread through my body. My vision blurred as I tried to look up at him. I wished my lasers still worked but they didn't. Edward walked up to me and placed his hand around my neck.

"You should watch it, _machine_ , you're not getting away with this." He started squeezing my neck, though he wasn't getting very far with it, at least I was built to resist this kind of torture. In the corner of my eye I saw the door opening and some men came inside, pulling Edward away from me and taking him into the hallway. Not much later someone else came inside. It was a young woman, dressed in a lab coat. She had brown hair, steady eyes and a sweet but nervous smile on her face. She rushed inside with some medical equipment.

"Hello," she greeted with a kind voice, "Oh gods, you look really bad." She noticed the large blood stain on my shirt. My hands weren't free to stop the blood so my whole shirt was soaked from the waist down. The woman put her equipment on the table and walked over to me. "I'm going to release you from your handcuffs now, will you please not punch me? You won't make it out of the door, 'cause there are guards there, okay?"

"Yeah okay," I said. The woman seemed really nervous for some reason, she probably wasn't very used to danger or something like that.

"Great," she smiled, while releasing my handcuffs. "I'm Jemma Simmons, by the way. You can call me Jemma, or Simmons it doesn't really matter. Could you ehm, could you please lie down on the table? I'm not permitted to move you from this room, so I'll have to do it here." Her voice was high pitched and enthusiast.

"Alright," I said. My anger, that I had just used to almost kill someone, was gone. Being with someone who acted kind to me, like I'm just as normal as her, helped me. I had no problem with hurting innocent people but I had the feeling she was right, it would be better to leave her alone."I'm Marcus, though I guess you already knew that," I said as I did what she had asked.

"Yes I know, I mean, they've told me who you are and why you're here and... you know what, forget I said that, it doesn't matter. It's nice to meet you, Marcus." She smiled nervously while she grabbed her equipment box and searched for something. "I ehm, I need to remove your shirt now, otherwise I can't get the bullet out."

"You're actually going to help me?" I asked, though it wasn't really that surprising.

"Well yes I can't let you die and you're obviously going to die this way and also... yeah they want you alive too, that's a good thing, right?" She took a pair of scissors from her box and started cutting my shirt in half. She took a quick look at my wound and then took a pair of forceps from her box. "So this might hurt a lot, I can try to anesthetize the wound but I don't know if it will work, or I can..."

"Just do it, it's okay, I can handle," I interrupted. She nodded and took a breath, her hands suddenly steady as she started working. She was right, it did hurt but I clenched my jaw and took the pain. She easily took the bullet out and laid it aside.

"I should do a quick scan to see if nothing got damaged," she said but she seemed to talk more to herself than to me.

"Don't bother," I told her, "I'm fine." I would know if something important got damaged but nothing was, it wasn't so easy to cause extreme damage to me with a simple bullet.

"Are you sure?" she asked.

"Completely," I answered.

"Okay, then I'll stitch it up and you should be fine."

"Thanks." She hesitated a bit when she heard me say that, as if she suddenly remembered something. She probably did, I'm sure they would've told her stories about my insane inhumanity. She recovered fast, taking her needed equipment before stitching my wound. When she was done she handed me a new shirt, a completely white one. I put it on as she packed her equipment back into the box. "Jemma?" I asked before she could leave.

"Yes?"

"Is there someone who can hear us at this moment?" I needed to know if I could talk openly to her right now. She seemed like a person who is easy to persuade, to manipulate. Not that it would be really necessary, 'cause I think she wants to help me without any manipulation.

"Ehm, well Fitz is the only one watching the camera's at the moment. He's a friend." That would have to suffice then.

"Do you know when they're going to release me?" I asked, putting on a sad face. Jemma hesitated, opened her mouth and closed it again but eventually she told me that she didn't know. "Jemma, please, will you... will you help me? I can't be here right now, there's someone I've got to see before I..." I stopped there, biting my lip and letting tears spill over. I tried my best to look as innocent and broken as possible, showing her a pained teenage boy, instead of the machine they made me look like.

"Before you what?" she asked worriedly. She had walked a bit closer again, to where I sat on the table.

"I... I'm going to die, Jemma, I just want to be with my family now." Jemma stood with her mouth opened, her eyes wide, she was shocked. That was good. She actually cared.

"Please, please stop crying," she tried as she laid a hand on my shoulder to comfort me. "Just... where do you live?" she asked. I looked up at her and led my eyes fill with hope. Suddenly the door burst open and a young man came inside. He looked into the hallway one last time before closing the door. "Fitz," Jemma said surprised.

"Jemma, what are you doing? You shouldn't..." The man, Fitz as he was called, stopped there because he suddenly realized I could hear them talking. "Jemma, please come with me," he took her arm and gently tried to get her out of the room.

"No, Fitz, we've got to help him! Look at all the horrible things they're doing to him here," she gestured to my nose and neck, that were probably showing bruises. "He needs to be home when he... if he..." She didn't finish her sentence. "How can we live with ourselves when we know we didn't even try to save him?" Fitz stared at me before looking back at Jemma. "Please, Fitz," she begged while grabbing his hand. Fitz sighed.

"You know they're going to fire us for this, right?"

"They don't have to know, I can hack your system and mess with the security cams." I told them. "I only need the poison to be worn out." Jemma smiled brightly.

"Oh! I can help you with that!" She walked to the table and placed her equipment box on it again. She searched for a while and then pulled out a small bottle with a strange liquid in it, after that she pulled out a needle. "This will fasten your blood stream, so the poison will leave your system sooner. It will feel a bit strange but don't worry, it won't last long." She pushed the needle into the liquid and made sure she took the right amount.

"Jemma?" Fitz asked. "I know you want to help him but is it smart to do that?"

"Fitz..." she complained.

"No he's right," I said. They both turned to me with a questioning look. "You don't even know me, you're right not to trust a stranger but I won't hurt you. I can't get myself out of here, I need your help."

"Don't worry, Marcus, we do trust you, right Fitz?" Fitz agreed with her but I could see he didn't actually trust me. I couldn't blame him, I wouldn't have trusted myself either. "Do you mind if I...?" She gestured with her needle. I smiled at her.

"No, go ahead, thank you." She injected the fluid and I immediately felt the change it caused. For a few seconds I felt myself become very dizzy, but then it was all over again and I noticed the poison was already gone. "Wow, that stuff is amazing." She chuckled.

"Yes it is, isn't it?" She put her needle away and looked at me. "If we want to get you out of here we'll have to make sure no one will recognise you. Hmm... what can we do? Oh I know! I know something, you'll be recognizable but only by people who know you. You aren't the only prisoner around here so no one will automatically assume it's you. See? Perfect!" She reached into her equipment box and pulled another bottle out of it.

"You truly have got everything in there, don't you?" I asked, smiling.

"Well, almost, there's some stuff missing like..."

"Jemma," Fitz interrupted, "it was just a remark."

"Oh, yeah right, sorry." She said. "Well, let's do this, I'm going to make you a bit... uhm... deformed but don't worry it won't last long... well we actually _do_ need to worry about that, 'cause we need to get you outside in time but what I mean is, it does wear of." I laughed.

"That's okay, I get it," I told her. She smiled and stepped forward to also inject this fluid, she injected it in the veins of my neck, so that the fluid would directly stream upwards. There was a very strange feeling in my face, it also hurt a bit but not really that much.

"Well," she concluded, "you don't want to see your face now."

"I don't want to see it either, so shall we go?" Fitz asked, already opening the door to see if there was anyone in the hallway. "All clear," he said.

"Take me to the control room then I can make sure no one will ever find out about your help." Fitz nodded and took the lead. He opened the security room where no one was to be found at this time.

"We're a bit short on men, most are gone with Agent Coulson and won't be back for a couple of days," Fitz explained. "There is supposed to be someone here and because of the mess you made with Agent Edward that someone was supposed to be me." He walked over to the control panels and showed me the recording of the past minutes. I just had to make sure the screen showed fake footage of me sitting at the table and Jemma immediately leaving after helping. That wasn't really hard to do, it took me no more than two minutes.

"Done," I said, "what now?"

"I will guide you out of here," Jemma offered, then she turned to Fitz. "You need to stay here and watch the camera's, warn us when someone comes close to us, it's best if no one sees us." Fitz seemed to dislike the idea of staying behind but he didn't complain. Most likely because he knew complaining wouldn't work anyway.

"Alright, be careful," he said. Jemma reassured him that everything would be fine before she took me to the hallway. She dragged me along through the hallways, in all kinds of directions, making sure to first check with Fitz if it was safe before walking around a corner. Just when she told me that we were almost there Fitz voice came through her earpiece. _"There's someone coming in your direction, hide yourself."_ But there wasn't really much room for hiding.

"We're going to have to do this differently," I whispered to Jemma, "I'm going to pretend that I escaped and I'm holding you as hostage, okay?"

"Why, I can just tell them I have orders from director Fury to get you somewhere else."

"No, you can't. They will ask you to proof it, which you can't and then they know you're helping me. We have to do this my way." Jemma didn't look particularly happy but she nodded.

"Okay then." We heard their footsteps coming closer, Fitz had spoken about one person, but I heard that there was more than one. I grabbed Jemma's shoulder and gently placed my hand close to her neck, letting the little hidden saws come out. Jemma yelped.

"Sorry, I should've warned you about that but don't worry. I won't hurt you." I looked up at the two men and one woman who came around the corner. "Stop right there!" I told them. They immediately did. The three people had unfamiliar faces but there was something about them that I _did_ recognise.

"Marcus?" One of them asked carefully. I looked at them closely, their shapes were familiar... I looked at their necks and noticed a tiny little square that I recognised as a cyber-mask.

"Chase?" I asked in disbelief. It was him, together with Adam and Bree. They had come for me... they actually came to rescue me. Chase removed his cyber-mask and smiled at me. I suddenly realised it was no longer necessary to pretend and quickly let Jemma go.

"What's going on?" she asked.

"They're my friends," I said, "they came for me." I said it out loud and couldn't actually believe myself, but they were really there.

"Of course we came for you, Marcus, but we have to leave quickly, it won't be long till they find out we don't belong here," Chase explained. I nodded in understanding.

"Jemma, and Fitz too if you can hear me, thank you so much for your help. I can never repay you." Jemma smiled at me and then she suddenly hugged me.

"You don't have to repay us, we're glad we could help. Go with them and… go have a good time." I thanked her once more and then quickly followed Adam, Bree and Chase. Chase easily led us outside, he even had fake ID's and a fake warrant to show the guards. In no time we were outside and left with the Davencar they had come with.

"Thank you, guys," I said as Adam had driven away from the facility. Chase, who sat beside me, laid a hand on my leg and squeezed it gently.

"Don't worry, Marcus, we're your friends, we're there to help when you need us."

"And of course Chase wouldn't let us do anything else till we helped you," Bree joked.

"Hey that's not..."

"It's true!" Adam turned his head to look at Chase. He almost hit another car while doing so.

"Adam! Eyes on the road, please!" Bree said.

"Yeah right, sorry," Adam laughed when he looked into the mirror and saw the other car had hit a mailbox. I grimaced in pain as Adam suddenly drove halfway up the sidewalk. Chase noticed and stared at me with worry in his eyes.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"Just a superficial wound, nothing bad," I lied, feeling a bit guilty that I was lying so easily again, but I just didn't want him to worry about me.

"What happened there?" he asked, looking at my face, which had become normal again and was now only showing the bruises Agent Edward gave me.

"It doesn't matter, nothing too bad." I said, that being the truth. It didn't matter anymore, I was free now. Suddenly everything there didn't matter anymore. "Did my father do this?" I asked, I needed to know. I noticed how much I hoped for the answer to be no. All I wanted was to believe that my father wasn't as bad as I thought he was. That he _does_ love me and somewhere still cares for me. But as much as I hoped, I knew the answer before he had spoken. I knew it before S.H.I.E.L.D had taken away. He _did_ do it, all because he thought the worst of me. He cared too much about himself to take the risk of saving me. I had always heard people say that you should put your children first, you should always try to give them their best shot. But I was never really his son, now was I? He is my creator and I'm his creation, that's all we ever were.

"I'm sorry, Marcus, but he did," Chase confirmed. "He's still working on your chip, despite everything, but only because we forced him. Eddy locked the place down, he can't go anywhere." I nodded. That was good, at least he's still cooperating. Though I'm sure that's only because he's forced, if he doesn't cooperate they will hurt him and he doesn't want that.

"What time is it?" I didn't really want to know, actually. All kinds of people were already on their way to work or anywhere else. That meant it's at least past six in the morning. Making the time that was left for me to become shorter and shorter. It wasn't exactly that I was afraid to die, that had always been a risk for me. I just didn't want to. There were tons of things I still wanted to do and first on the list was showing Douglas he had made a big mistake with dumping me. What would the others do when they couldn't help me? What would Chase do? How soon would he forget me?

"Marcus?" I looked at Chase, who stared at me very intensely. "You're worrying again, will you stop that? There's enough time left to help you." He lifted his hand from my leg, I hadn't noticed it had still lain there. Then he placed my hand in his again, squeezing gently before smiling at me. "What do you want to do when we're home?"

"Hey lovebirds, I don't wanna spoil it, but we already are home," Bree said, knocking on the window.

"Oh," Chase said sheepishly. I chuckled because of the face he made and we got out of the car. We went inside their house and I was immediately called over by Bree. She had disappeared inside and now she was suddenly standing in the living room again.

"Mr. Davenport wants you down," she told me, pointing at the elevator. "Oh and ehm, Douglas is down there too, just so that you know." I nodded. It didn't matter, I had to confront him anyway but not now. Now I would simply ignore him and do what Mr. Davenport asked. I stepped into the elevator, telling Chase that I would be back up as soon as possible. Once inside the elevator I pressed the button of the right floor and listened to the music playing.

"Jeez, who would've thought his ego was _that_ big?" I wondered out loud as I recognized the voice of Mr. Davenport, singing 'Twinkle twinkle little star'. A beep sounded and the doors opened.

"Ah, there you are." Mr. Davenport had apparently waited for me, since he stood directly in front of the elevator to drag me along into the lab. I immediately noticed Douglas standing on the other side of the lab, busy with what should be my new chip. He looked up as I entered the lab, he tried to smile as if nothing had happened.

"Son, how are you?" he asked.

"Douglas I told you..." Mr. Davenport started but I interrupted him.

"No it's okay, let me," I told him with a smile, then I turned to Douglas, my eyes deadly serious. "Shut the fuck up," I told him. He took the warning and went back to his work. Mr. Davenport sighed, but ignored his brother for the time being.

"Okay... so ehm... I need to remove your chip for a moment. I need to copy all the data on your chip to a hard drive, so I can later copy it back to your new chip. Otherwise you will lose all your memories, your personality and you might even miss some bionics." Mr. Davenport didn't wait for permission, it was obvious that it was already granted. He began typing some data on his cyber desk and gestured for me to sit down on the chair standing before him. "Your system will shut down when I remove your chip. Copying all the data on your chip might take a while but I should be ready within an hour."

"Thank you, Mr. Davenport, for helping me." I heard Douglas chuckle on the background but I choose to ignore him, he could expect my revenge later.

"I know, I'm awesome," Mr. Davenport said, "Now sit down, you can save your infinite gratitude for later." I laughed and did as he asked. "Sweet dreams," Mr. Davenport said before removing my chip.

 _ **[Warning]:**_ _chip_removed._

 _ **System_is_now_shutting_down!¡!**_

 _01100011 01101000 01101001 01110000_

 _00100000_

 _01110010 01100101 01110000 01101100 01100001 01100011 01100101 01100100_

 _ **[Message]:**_ _chip_replaced._

 _01110011 01111001 01110011 01110100 01100101 01101101_

 _00100000_

 _01101001 01110011_

 _00100000_

 _01101110 01101111 01110111_

 _00100000_

 _01110010 01100101 01100010 01101111 01101111 01110100 01101001 01101110 01100111_

 _ **System_is_now_rebooting**_

 _01110010 01100101 01100010 01101111 01101111 01110100 01101001 01101110 01100111_

 _01110010 01100101 01100010 01101111 01101111 01110100 01101001 01101110 01100111_

 _01110010 01100101 01100010 01101111 01101111 01110100 01101001 01101110 01100111_

 _ **System_is_now_back_online**_

 _ ****_I opened my eyes and the first thing I saw was the happy face of Mr. Davenport in front of me. "Great, you're awake again! How are you feeling? Everything fine?" I looked around, moved my arm a bit and got to my feet, then I focused on Douglas and activated my molecular kineses to pin him to the wall. He screamed in surprise. I laughed at his reaction.

"Yup, everything is working perfectly," I confirmed before dropping Douglas to the ground.

"Well that's good. Now go back upstairs and do something fun or whatever, we need to get back to work."

"Yes, of course," I said, knowing both Mr. Davenport and Douglas worked better when no one was around. I left them alone and went upstairs, where Chase had been waiting for me. He was sitting on the couch, watching the telly, but he got to his feet when I entered the room.

"Hey, how are you?" he asked. I shrugged and walked up to him.

"Okay, I guess, Mr. Davenport copied my data to a hard drive."

"Ah, I already thought he would do that." Chase smiled and sat back down on the couch, I dropped myself on the couch next to him. "So, you wanna play a video game or something?"

"Sure," I said, having never played a video game with someone else before, playing video games was rare for me, even on my own. "What do you've got?"

"Well, we've got _a lot_ , almost everything since Leo is addicted to video games. How about Halo?"

"Sounds good," I said, having heard of it before. I really didn't know what time it was, but I also didn't ask. Chase started his console and loaded the game, there was a coop mode so we played it together. We had already reached 'New Alexandria' when things became a bit suspicious.

"Are you feeling okay?" Chase asked as I had let my character jump into the same pit for the fourth time. I looked at my fingers as I tried to make it further for the this time. I tried to let my character jump but my finger landed a full centimetre beside the jump button. "Maybe we have played a bit too long." Chase tried. He couldn't fool me though, it was obvious what was happening. My time was nearly up and my system was probably running on its last energy.

"It's almost time, isn't it?" I asked. Chase looked a bit uncomfortable but he nodded.

"Don't worry, they'll finish in time," he reassured me and presumably himself too. I trusted Mr. Davenport, he hardly failed in anything and there was no use in worrying now.

"Can we maybe go outside?" I asked as I noticed how the air seemed to thicken around me. I took slow breaths but somehow it still felt like my brains were floating out of my head.

"Of course." Chase got to his feet and I gathered my strength to do the same. When I stood on my feet I almost immediately fell down again, but I managed to maintain my balance. For some reason the perfect balance I always had was completely gone. I took my gaze away from the ground to look at Chase, but when I did, it took a few seconds before my eyes had adjusted to the new image.

"Dying sucks," I told Chase while managing a smile.

"You are _not_ going to..."

"Please, don't do that talk." The last thing I wanted to hear right now is that there was nothing to worry about 'cause all was going to be well and then it would be like nothing had happened and blah blah blah. Right now, _nothing_ was fine and it would certainly never be like nothing has ever happened. I hated those pep-talks and endless hope speeches, 'cause honestly it won't help you.

"Let's just go outside then," Chase suggested, looking at me worriedly, though he tried to hide it. I nodded and turned to the door. My eyes adjusted as slowly as before, making the image I saw a messed up assemblage from Chase, the TV, a table, a piece of wall and the door. After a few seconds my view sharpened and I saw the door clearly again. I took a step towards the door, but it was so misguided that I would've fallen to the ground if Chase hadn't caught me. He didn't say anything, which I appreciated, but instead just helped me to get out of the house. When we were outside, we didn't walk much further. We sat down on the sidewalk in front of the house. Without being able to lean against something it was hard to sit straight up. I tried for a few minutes but I soon gave up, it was too tiring, so I shove closer to Chase and rested my head against his shoulder.

"Marcus?" Chase asked.

"Yes?" He didn't answer anymore, he just nodded. He just wanted to make sure that I was still there.

"Thank you, Chase, for being there for me and helping me, even though I never deserved it." My voice came out like a whisper, for some reason it sounded so soft that I doubted if Chase had even heard it, but I suddenly felt Chase's hand on my chin, lifting my face up so he could look into my eyes.

"Don't ever do that, Marcus, I'm not loosing you. I made a promise and I'm keeping it." I was about to protest but I was effectively stopped when he leaned closer and pressed his lips against mine. I didn't move, I was too tired to do so. I wished he had kissed me before, 'cause at this moment all my nerves were dimmed, so I hardly noticed the contact. Chase smiled at me. "You're going to be fine." The sun suddenly seemed brighter, which made Chase look almost white. His mouth moved but I didn't hear what he said. I vaguely noticed that he wrapped his arms around me. His warmth was overwhelming. I smiled at him as he kept on talking, but I had no idea what he was talking about.

 _ **[Warning]:**_ _Chip_overloaded_

 _ **[Warning]:**_ _Chip_overloaded_

 _ **System_will_shut_down_in_ten_seconds**_

 _ **Please_replace_chip_now**_

 _ **System_will_shut_down_in_nine_seconds**_

 _ ****_I ignored the warnings and kept my eyes locked on Chase's face. His mouth still moved, his eyes were watery and he looked a bit panicked. Why is he so worried? I wondered, 'cause everything was fine. The warmth, the light, his company, it was all fine.

 _ **Please_replace_chip_now**_

 _ **System_will_shut_down_in_four_seconds**_

 _ **Please_replace_chip_now**_

 _ ****_I smiled at Chase and closed my eyes, unable to keep them open any longer. It was fine, it was all fine. Chase was still there, he would always be there. I vaguely noticed some footsteps, but it didn't matter, nothing mattered. I smiled once more.

 _ **Please_replace_chip_now**_

 _ **Please_replace _chip_now**_

 _ **System_is_now_shutting_down!¡!**_

 _01010011 01111001 01110011 01110100 01100101 01101101 00100000 01101001 01110011 00100000_

 _01101110 01101111 01110111_

 _00100000 01110011 01101000 01110101 01110100 01110100 01101001 01101110 01100111_

 _00100000 01100100 01101111 01110111 01101110__

 _01100011 01101000 01101001 01110000_

 _00100000_

 _01110010 01100101 01110000 01101100 01100001 01100011 01100101 01100100_

 _ **[Message]:**_ _chip_replaced._

 _01110011 01111001 01110011 01110100 01100101 01101101_

 _00100000_

 _01101001 01110011_

 _00100000_

 _01101110 01101111 01110111_

 _00100000_

 _01110010 01100101 01100010 01101111 01101111 01110100 01101001 01101110 01100111_

 _ **System_is_now_rebooting**_

 _01110010 01100101 01100010 01101111 01101111 01110100 01101001 01101110 01100111_

 _01110010 01100101 01100010 01101111 01101111 01110100 01101001 01101110 01100111_

 _01110010 01100101 01100010 01101111 01101111 01110100 01101001 01101110 01100111_

 _ **System_is_now_back_online**_

 __I groan. Argh... stupid headache. Wait, where am I? I open my eyes but immediately close them again because of the enormous amount of light. I feel a hand on my arm as someone comes closer.

"Marcus?" Someone asks, his voice is filled with hope. I try to open my eyes again, but this time more slowly. I blink as I try to adjust to the light, after a few seconds I recognize the shape of a face above mine. It's Chase's face. "Marcus!" he exclaims happily while he bents forward to hug me. Why is he hugging me? He hates me, he wants me dead... he shouldn't be hugging me. I look up at him in confusion and he immediately understands me. "What do you remember?"

"What should I remember?" I asked, unsure what he wants to know.

"You came to us, asking if you could stay with us for a while, since your father threw you out." I frown as I think about what he said. "You received this letter when you stayed with us." Chase adds as he hands me a folded letter. I open it and read ' _Dear Marcus',_ suddenly everything comes back to me. Everything that had happened, my father who lied to me, Chase who helped me, my father who betrayed me once more, Mr. Davenport, Bree and Adam who had also been kind to me and Chase who had kissed me just before I...

"Is this hell? Are you the devil?" I ask and Chase doubts a bit. I laugh at the frown he makes. "I know it isn't, you kept your promise." Chase smiles too and I pull him closer to kiss him properly this time.

"Chase, you truly need to eeaaaa... oh." Mr. Davenport had entered the room without us noticing it. He places his tray with food on a table uncomfortably. Then he suddenly seems to realise something. "You're awake! Finally! I started to wonder if something went wrong." I get to my feet, not having the slightest problem with doing so. It feels as if someone has given me an energy-boost. I walk up to him and hug him tightly.

"Thank you so much, Mr. Davenport." He pulls a face at the contact but I can see it's only to maintain his so called honour.

"Glad to help Marcus, but since you're now feeling so well again, I do have to make something clear."

"Big D, come on..." Chase starts but Mr. Davenport holds his hand up.

"No Chase, I have to say this. You're welcome to stay with us for as long as you want _but_ living under _my_ roof, means _my_ rules and I don't want to see you doing anything bad anymore." I nod at his conditions. It was fair and logical, although I'm not sure if I can keep myself from pushing slow grandma's aside when they walk exactly where I want to walk.

"Yes, of course, thank you Mr. Davenport," I say and promise myself to do my very best to behave better. Well... I'll start tomorrow. I think to myself, because I first need to do something else, something that probably categorized as "bad". "Where is Douglas?" I ask. Mr. Davenport doubts a bit but decides to tell the truth.

"Back home, I promised we would leave him alone after he helped us." I smile at him.

"That's kind of you, but fortunately I didn't make that promise." I start walking towards the door, but Chase calls for me.

"Marcus, don't go there, just give it a rest," he pleads but I can't do that. I _can't_. At first I wanted to but he spoiled that opportunity for himself. Now he is going to get my revenge and there is nothing, absolutely nothing they can do to stop me and they know it.

"I _will_ give it a rest," I say, looking at Chase, "but that will be _after_ I talk to him." With that I leave them alone, I know it might be a bit rude because they just saved my life but well... that's me. They'll have to deal with it. I take the elevator upstairs and in the living room I bump into Adam, who is trying to fit a watermelon into the fridge.

"Hey, look guys it's Marcus!" he calls happily to the others before hugging me.

"Yes, it's me, hooray," I say sarcastically, "I need to go somewhere." I walk past him and ignore the worried looks of Bree and Leo. I leave their house and walk to the end of the street, where my motorcycle is still parked. Without hesitation I drive it home and enter the house uninvited. I open the door to the lab where he's probably hiding out and enter it.

"Marcus." Douglas is, indeed, in his lab. He's working on something, probably his new project since he doesn't have me anymore.

"Douglas."

"What do you want?" he asks, probably knowing very well what I'm here for. I spread my arms and laugh at his comment.

"What do you think, _dad,_ take a guess."

"Right, if you're here to kill me then go ahead, 'cause I'm not the one who's going to get in trouble for it." I smile at him as I walk closer, not in the least intimidated by the way he acts.

"Oh father, come on, you should know I won't kill you," I say and enjoy the look of surprise on his face as he, just for a second, thinks I actually won't hurt him. "No, you see, killing is too easy. _You_ taught me that." He swallows and tries to think of a solution, I can see it in his face. His only opportunity is the remote lying on the table right next to him, I don't know what it does, but he isn't going to get it. He reaches out for it, but I raise my hand and stop him with my molecular kineses.

"Don't even think about it," I warn him. Then I move both his arms on his back and force him on his knees. His face looks pained as he tries to escape from my grip but he knows I'm too strong. "I want you to know something. I was going to leave you alone." He laughs at that.

"Oh come on, boy, don't fool yourself."

"I'm not fooling myself, you brought this upon yourself when you decided to involve S.H.I.E.L.D in it!' I scream in his face, for a moment unable to control my emotions.

"Yeah, tell that to yourself, Marcus, I'm sure you'll sleep a lot better but the truth is, you would've come anyway. No matter if you really wanted to or not. You are programmed for destruction, Marcus, for evil, for not giving a shit when you take a life or worse." I let my anger take over and push him up against the wall, my eyes glowing green, threatening to laser through him at any moment.

" _You_ do _not_ decide who _I_ am! I make my own future and thanks to the 'oh so mean' Mr. Davenport I even got one!" I walk over to him, let the grip of my molecular kineses go and replace it with my own strength, placing my hand on his neck. "You should've known better than to let me even come near you!" Then I suddenly realize it... he should've known better... Douglas laughs maniacally and moves his hand to his pocket, taking out a device and pressing a button before I could remove it. Out of nowhere I feel a sudden force pulling at me. "What are you doing?" I demand as I try to maintain my spot, but the force is too strong. I get sucked backwards and get smacked against a hard wall.

"Arghh..." I growl. I try to get to my feet but for some reason I remain stuck to the wall. Douglas laughs at my struggle. "What is this!" I yell at him, making him only laugh more.

"This," he gestures to the wall around me, "this is my magnetic wall, and you my dear boy, are made of metal." I growl once more, what was I thinking?! I should've known he has something like this! He always has a plan to save his own life, how could I have been so stupid to ignore that?

"Damn you! Let me go and fight me like a real man!" That made him laugh even more.

"A _real_ man? Like you, I suppose? _You_ are nothing more than a machine, Marcus, you can tell yourself otherwise but a machine is all you are and all you'll ever be."

"Shut up!"

"Aww... sorry, did I hurt your feelings? Well I suppose it can't be that bad. Machines don't feel, that's what they always say, right?"

"Shut the fuck up! You don't get to say anything about me!" I scream at him, all my calmness now completely gone.

"Don't scream at me like that!" he yells into my face, his hardly a few centimetres from mine. I suddenly realize that I could still use my lasers. "Tut tut, boy I shouldn't do that if I were you." Of course I don't listen and do it anyway. It didn't work. It's like my eyes are exploding. Like I cast the laser inside instead of outside.  
"What did you do to me?" I ask, growling.  
"I built you, Marcus, don't you think I know how to destroy you?"  
"Let me go! They will come for you if you don't!" Douglas laughs and walks away from me.  
"Well I hope they do, they've grown fond of you pretty fast, haven't they? If only you were that successful before. I might have even searched for a way to save you." I don't react to his words. He lied. He wouldn't have saved me and he isn't prepared for an attack. It is obvious, actually. He had spent his whole life letting family down. The thought that they will come for me wouldn't have occurred him. _If_ they come for me. Well, this isn't the time to doubt that. It's my only chance. The best I can do now is keep him occupied, otherwise he might think of a solution.  
"You wouldn't have, it was never your plan to save me. It was never about me." He looks up from what he is working on.  
"Of course it wasn't. You didn't seriously think that, did you?"  
"Can you blame me for thinking that you cared about me? You spent your whole life pretending to be my father."  
"Yes, I was pretty good at that, wasn't I?"  
"All because you weren't able to catch Adam, Bree and Chase yourself."  
"Ahhh I get what you're doing! You are trying to distract me from the real problem, nope not going to work!" He walks to his desk and proceeds working on... whatever it is he is doing. Suddenly the door opens again and Leo storms inside.  
" _Haha!_ " He screams as he points some kind of gun at Douglas. Behind him Adam, Bree and Chase come in.  
"Hands in the air, freak," Chase says, quickly removing all objects lying close to Douglas. Douglas does

as he says, knowing there's nothing he can do. Bree runs up to him and takes his device away, pressing the button to release me. I land on my feet and I quickly walk over to Chase. Chase smiles at me and takes my hand in his. I notice Douglas raising his eyebrow at the gesture but he wisely decides not to say anything about it.  
"Douglas," Chase says, drawing his attention "We only let you go on one condition, that _you_ leave _us_ alone. And Marcus belongs to us now too. So I suggest you leave him alone, otherwise we come back for you and you know you can't defeat all of us." Douglas doesn't react. He just nods, knowing it's the truth. Chase then turns to me. "Ready to go?" I nod. They leave the room and I follow them. This room is no longer mine. The time I spent here belong to the past. It doesn't define me. I look over my shoulder once.  
"Goodbye, Douglas." I close the door and follow my new family to my new home. Ready to write my own future.

 _Author's note:_

 _Tada! That was my story;)_

 _I must now thank my sister for helping me with the story and also for checking my grammar and stuff^^_

 _Well, I hope you all agree with me that something like this is a much better ending for our precious Marcus. He deserves so much more than he got on the show, my poor little thing._

 _And just like before, let me know what you think;)_


End file.
